Elements of Belonging
by PurpleYin
Summary: Fic collection for Ava Sharpe character study one shots. Chapter 1 - Ava goes home for the first time after the truth about her origins is revealed.
1. Chapter 1: Truth and (Comforting) Lies

**A/N:** Thanks to unwittingcatalyst for betareading. :)

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**Ava goes home for the first time after the truth about her origins is revealed.**

She goes home to Fresno. She smiles, she hugs her_ parents _: doesn't tell them she knows. She can see they wonder, their discomfort showing through, passed off as the surprise she's come home unexpectedly – they never liked that and now she knows why.

She likes to pretend. To eat the snicker-doodles. To sleep in her old bed that feels like exactly what it is no matter why it was manufactured. The lie is so carefully constructed – from the faded postcard on the pin-board sent by her best friend who moved away when she was 13, to the My Little Pony she knows is in a box in the top of the closet that would now be collectible if not for the bite mark from the neighbors dog, and the quilt spread over the bed with patches of her old clothes sewn in - she doesn't want to tear the fabrication down yet because she has nothing to replace it with.

**This** is the one part of her life that feels stable. It's a lie but it's a comfort she can't give up immediately. She pulls the covers tighter around her and listens to the sound of the suburbs, the chink of drinks downstairs, her parents having a nightcap. Some part of her wonders what they really think of her, if they think she should have known, if they know she does. They go on playing the part though, probably because they are still being paid. Now Ava knows she's found the anomaly in the budget, traced it through several shell corporations with the reluctant help of a scared Bureau accountant who a different Director swore to secrecy. Most people don't know the cost of their childhood, she knows the cost of her whole identity, down to the cent.


	2. Chapter 2: Memories

**Warning **for mentioned minor character deaths from illness.

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**Ava and her memories**

Ava tries very hard to find the difference in her memories – as if she should be able to find a seam between who she has been told she is, who she was **made** to be, and who she has lived as for six years. She can't find any. Her memories are fuzzier the longer back she tries to remember, but from what Gary has explained, that's perfectly usual. Recall is harder as you grow older and the experiences are further away, whether clone or not. It's a relief that it isn't just her design, a trick. Then she remembers it _is_ still a trick, isn't it? All those memories might be indistinguishable from any others but they aren't real, they just seem as if they are. Implanted to mimic how they should be because of the biology she shares with everyone else. Those things did not happen to her and without the file to explain - without Rip - she will never know who made her how she is.

She wants to look them in the eye and ask why they made her cry her eyes out over her first crush. Or why the bullies who harassed her for a whole semester when she unwisely let the knowledge of her crush slip out in class. Why her grandmother died of cancer when she was ten and her grandfather a year after that of pneumonia. But she knows the answer to that – to make her strong, to write her history so she takes up martial arts, to make sure there are no more questions about her family. At least she doesn't have to wonder anymore about what the terrible feud was that severed ties with her mother's parents. They simply don't exist. The pain all imagined, acted out conveniently by her mother so nothing more need be said.

They gave her more too that she _wishes_ she had done. The Valentine's day card she proudly delivered to her crush in defiance of the bullies. Chairing the model UN at her high school. Being Valedictorian and addressing everyone with the best speech of her life, one she's never topped to this day. The letter she wrote to the White House about inadequate regulations after her trainer got seriously hurt in a competition. She has a framed reply for that, signed by President Clinton. She doesn't doubt that the signature is real. Knowing Rip, he could make it so - he could sell a lie like no other. He gave her everything he thought she would need to be Ava Sharpe.

Including an ex who made her wary of starting anything for _years_. Another useful lie to keep her focused on work. Something she has overcome. She gets to decide who Ava Sharpe is today.


End file.
